Well… I’m sorry I did.  In fact, I am sorry that I have involved myself with this company at all.  So dissatisfied, that I created a list on twitter for “Companies I Hate” and added Stream as the number one entry.  ***Edit: Stream Energy and I have come to a resolution for my particular concern. The resolution has been added later in this blog post.

Stream Energy's website - Jan. 2010 (click to see full-size)

Why?  Simple really – it all comes down to customer service.  But first, let’s look at their website again.  They claim, “With competitive rates and outstanding customer service, Stream Energy has quickly established itself as a leading power and gas utility company serving the needs of customers in Texas and Georgia.”

So they make a pretty bold claim here.  Not only will you get competitive rates, but you will get outstanding customer service.

First, the rates – they are in line with the others in my area.  Maybe a penny less per therm.  I have yet to get my bill, so I don’t know what surcharges are hidden in there and if in fact they will be less expensive.  The teaser rate is significantly less.  I’ll go along with the word “competitive” in this case.

Now, lets talk about customer service.  Or should I say dis-service.

I’m going to skip the whole PITA (pain in the ass) online application (which wastes a good 20 minutes [if you read everything] and  requires a follow up confirmation call) and skip right to the confirmation portion.  I was told I had a morning hook-up scheduled (hours between 8 AM and noon) and that I had to be on premises to pay a $25.00 connect fee.  Since my alternative residence is only 15 minutes away, I asked if they could call me en-route so that I could meet them.  I was told this was not possible.  OK, I can live with that so I made arrangements to not have appointments that morning so that I could sit in a house with no running water and no heat in order to wait for gas hook up.   Please note: The confirmation date was a good week and a half out and the premises in question is already equipped with a gas meter hook up.

Did they arrive on time?  If my watch was set for the Hawaiian Time Zone (UTC -10h), then yes.  A service tech did not arrive until 3:42 PM.  Yep, I waited almost twice as long as the window promised in a cold house, losing billable time.

Now I am hungry and have my afternoon appointments in jeopardy because the hook up has not occurred yet.  I call my clients and reschedule.  I call Stream to find out what the deal with my hook up is.   Did I call Stream Energy?  You bet I did. By the way – if you don’t know your account number, you will need to go through several menu choices to talk to a representative.

Here’s where I get mad.  I am now told that my hook up is an all day appointment.  I ask how long is a day – what are the working hours?  I am told it shows as all day.  Yes, you told me that.  When does the day end?  4 PM? 5PM? 7PM?  Worse, I felt as if I couldn’t ask my question because the CSR kept interrupting me before I finished asking my question.  How can you help me if you don’t listen to my question?  I am given the phone number for Atlanta Gas Light.  Great, another number to call because Stream can’t answer my question.  Inefficient and rude.

I call AGL.  They send a tech over who tells me that I didn’t need to be on premises and I don’t need to pay $25.00 on the spot.  Great – now Stream totally had me waiting there for no reason and I lost a complete day of billable time.   A whole day of billable time to save on 2 months of service.  Yeah – that’s a good deal!

***Resolution communication

So what to do?  Turn to social media.  They have FaceBook and Twitter plastered on their website.  Unfortunately, on FaceBook – its a FAN page.  At this point I am anything but a FAN.  So I tweet.  I decide I am going to Tweet at least once a day until I either receive a response from Stream OR get sick of bashing a company.

It took Stream Energy ONE WEEK to respond to me.  The initial contact did come from a Sr. Executive (name and position withheld without release permission).   I also recognize that every story has 3 sides:  both parties and the truth which lies somewhere in-between.   I’m also sure my view is still obscured by what I perceived to be lack of respect, rudeness, and a wasted day.  AND I appreciate them reaching out.  That act restores some credibility.

So after a few other e-mails, I receive a few phone calls (yes they were persistent since I did not return the calls at first) from a senior leader of their customer service team.   He informed me that he had personally looked into the matter and that they would be using this situation as a learning experience for their representatives.  Hopefully my experience will benefit other customers.  The key points for me as a learning experience are as follows:

1. Provide accurate appointment data such as time, presence required, and fees to the customer for hook-up day.
2. If Stream can’t provide #1, then provide flexibility to the customer such as a courtesy call before the tech arrives. If that’s another company’s responsibility – work it out.  Stream is who I buy gas from.
3. Don’t make me call a third party.  Stream is my contact – and should handle it.
4. Ensure Stream’s customer service representatives listen to the customer’s concerns or questions.  And ensure they don’t provide vague unhelpful information.

I wish that was the end of the story.  Unfortunately its not.  And the rest of the story becomes a great case study for what to do/not do in terms of using social media for business development.

About two hours after hanging up the phone with the Customer Service leader, the same Sr. Executive whom initiated contact sent a follow up e-mail.  He kindly suggested I consider deleting my tweets and any related posts.  I kindly declined.

Here are the lessons learned for utilizing Social Media as a business strategy.

1. If you are create a social media business presence, be prepared to respond via social media  For example:
   • Visitors to your FaceBook page may not want to be a “fan” or “like” everything about your company.  Provide contact information access to your company there OR allow people to post content.
   • If you have a Twitter account for your company, be prepared to respond to tweets and questions in a timely fashion.  If you are just squatting on the Twitter handle – disclose that.
2. Establish some sort of “brand reputation” or “monitoring” strategy.  This can be an expensive solution such as Radian 6 or a cheap roll your own solution with Google Alerts.  It’s not hard and it will allow you to catch issues before they become serious problems.
3. Treat every faux-pas as a learning opportunity.  In this case, Stream did that.  Unfortunately they dropped the ball when they requested it go away.  Embrace your mistakes.  Show the world your company cares and adapts to legitimate concerns of the customer.  This will only help your brand.

I welcome any posts from Stream Energy on this matter.  I also welcome any thoughts or comments regarding Stream Energy’s request to consider removing my tweets and posts.

PRLog (Press Release) – Sep 08, 2009 – Palo Alto, CA, September 8 – Palo Alto based Social Media Academy announces its Black Diamond global social media consultant network. Certified social media consultants from the US, Europe, Singapore and Australia are set to collaborate on a global scale to help small, medium and large businesses create social media programs that are specifically tailored to their social media ecosystems. The group engages based on unified methodologies from the Social Media Academy, including the Four-Quadrant Social Media Assessment model, the Strategy Hexagon for developing a robust social media plan, and five other standardized methodologies.

Axel Schultze, Founder, CEO Social Media Academy

Social Media Academy founder Axel Schultze said: “Business leaders have a hard time to select a social media consultant that is right for them. Too many self proclaimed social media experts only confuse customers. We conquer this problem by creating a worldwide standard for methodologies, strategy development and social media execution plans. The Black Diamond Network consists of a worldwide network of certified social media consultants with a very transparent and unified experience profile.”

“Mark Moore, from Atlanta, GA, one of the founding members said: “One of our big advantages is our globally standardized methodology approach. Any member can jump into any project and knows exactly how we all work. This provides a great project security for small and large customers”. Boughty Canton, another founding member, from Singapore commented: “Businesses begin to understand that social media is not just a marketing tool but a general business strategy. As Black Diamonds members, we help companies to think and execute strategically”. Wendy Soucie from Wisconsin said: “An important aspect of the Black Diamond Network is our ability to provide very cost efficient social media packages to small businesses. Even though we are connected in a global network – the individual Black Diamonds operate locally. Each Black Diamond brings to the engagement an understanding of a particular regional area or even a vertical market dynamic.” Rick Speciale from Sydney, Australia and Catherine Sherwood from Albuquerque, NM see another advantage of the Black Diam ond group in the collaboration of different subject matter experts. “We both focus on the financial services industry. Collaborating with other experts while maintaining a standardized operating method gives customers the breadth and depth in expertise they expect”. Barbara Daniels from Mesa, AZ, also one of the founding members stated: “We collaborate on projects and strategic engagements as a group, each bringing our unique talents and backgrounds to create a synergy in the fast-paced world of social media that is the first of its kind. We take social media far beyond the marketing aspect, assisting companies in building mindshare and market share by imploring the proven principles and standardized methodologies of the Social Media Academy.”

The Black Diamond group is orche strated by the Social Media Academy and organizes knowledge webinars in the US, Europe and Asia helping businesses to better comprehend the impact social media has to their business, their market and their ecosystem. The Knowledge webinar series starts in September and is free of charge. A Black Diamond reception is established to help companies find the best social media strategist for their respective needs. The next leadership class, which is the base education to become a black diamond, starts September 16.

More details are available at: http://socialmedia-academy.com/BlackDiamonds

More corresponding links:

Social Media Academy http://socialmedia-academy.com

Social Media Leadership class http://socialmedia-academy.com/html/us-leadershipclass.cfm

Social Media Academy Methodology overview http://socialmedia-academy.com/html/methodologies.cfm

Social sites from people mentioned in this press release:

Axel Schultze http://xeeSM.com/AxelS

Barbara Daniels http://xeeSM.com/wk4coffee

Boughton Canton http://xeeSM.com/Boughty

Catherine Sherwood http://xeeSM.com/CatherineSherwood

Mark Moore http://xeeSM.com/RMarkMoore/

Rick Speciale http://xeeSM.com/speciale/

Walter Adamson http://xeeSM.com/walter/

Wendy Soucie http://xeeSM.com/wendysoucie/

# # # The Social Media Academy is an education and research institute providing education for business professionals from all industries on how to best apply social media to their respective businesses.

Disclaimer: Issuers of the press releases are solely responsible for the content of their press releases. PRLog.Org can’t be held liable for the contents of the press releases. Report Abuse

Side view of the U2 360° Stage known as "the Claw". This photo is from the July 17, 2009 Croke Park show in Dublin. Note the stage, outside circular walkway, and floating bridges.

This year, I repeated a favorite experience – that of seeing U2 live in concert, in their homeland city of Dublin no less.  This tour follows what I consider a lackluster album release.  The tour however has a complex stage (which reminds me of the Pop Mart tour with the huge lemon) providing the audience with what is billed as an unobstructed 360 degree view of the band.  The stage is also designed to allow the band to interact with the audience.  The stage layout is an extension of the previous Elevation and Vertigo tours where walkways allow the band to venture out from the core stage.  The core stage for this tour is a large disc surrounded by a circular walkway connected to the main stage by two floating bridges.  The whole complex is topped by an four post umbrella to which the speakers and video system are suspended.

Photo provided by my friend Mark Coffey in Ireland of the U2 360° Stage with the spire lit. This photo is from the July 17, 2009 Croke Park show in Dublin.

A vertical spike adds visual depth as well as the strobe and moving light systems.  The full effect of the lighting system is best seen from a distance as the sheer scale of the structure prevents one from seeing the tower from  close-up.  This structure is visually stunning.  As the night draws darker, the stage begins to reflect the color of the lights used, much like a chameleon matches its surroundings.  For the show in Croke, it changed between its natural light green and orange through dark green, yellow, orange, light and dark blues and red.

The video unit is rather unique.  At first look, it appears as a smooth screen for all sides of the stadium.  This whole structure can also move vertically as needed.

Notice the topmost position of the video screen in this photo by Mark Coffey.

Notice the screen lowered in this photo by Mark Coffey.

The most intriguing aspect of this display is that it can change shape (see photos).

Note the geometrical pattern the screen is comprised of. Photo by Mark Coffey.

The geometrical pattern in the screen expands, effectively doubling the size. You can see the expanded screen in the top portion of this photo by Mark Coffey.

Notice the screen expanded to its maximum size in this photo by Mark Coffey.

Enough about the stage – let’s move on to the band.

I titled this post U270°.  It’s sort of a joke, as Croke Park required modifications to the stage which eliminated the far section of the stadium as usable seating.  So much for 360 degrees.  I wish that was the only reason for the post title.  The band hardly moved from their positions on the main stage.  There was very little interaction with the audience in a manner provided for by the stage design.  The set list provided a nice balance from the catalog of songs and the band as usual performed at a top level.  The newer songs worked well with the stage design and the 2 hour concert seemed to pass by very quickly.  I look forward to comparing this European show to the upcoming Atlanta show in the US.

360° Tour 1st leg: Europe
2009-07-27: Croke Park – Dublin, Ireland
Support Acts: Bell X1, The Script

Setlist:
1. Breathe
2. No Line On The Horizon
3. Get On Your Boots
4. Magnificent
5. Beautiful Day
6. New Year’s Day
7. I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For / Movin’ On Up (snippet)
8. Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
9. Unknown Caller
10. The Unforgettable Fire
11. City Of Blinding Lights
12. Vertigo
13. I’ll Go Crazy If I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight / Relax (snippet) / Two Tribes (snippet)
14. Sunday Bloody Sunday / Rock The Casbah (snippet)
15. Pride (In The Name Of Love)
16. MLK
17. Walk On / You’ll Never Walk Alone (snippet)
18. Where The Streets Have No Name / All You Need Is Love (snippet)
19. One
20. 40 (snippet) / Bad / Fool To Cry (snippet)

Encore(s):
21. Ultra Violet (Light My Way)
22. With Or Without You / Shine Like Stars (snippet)
23. Moment of Surrender

Were you at the show?  What did you think?

That brings me to the main reminder – we all take things for granted.  sometimes they are large things, and sometimes they are the small details.  Seriously, I was planning on doing a little bit of work.  I figured I would not be able to sleep on the flight – luckily, that premise proved incorrect.  I was also going to log on so that Barb could do the provisioning for a last minute order she received while we were at the airport waiting for our flight to leave.  This item remains to be done only because the website was not very friendly to the iPhone’s Safari browser. OMG! – Again sarcasm.  We, collectively as a society, have become reliant on instant gratification.  And sometimes, that desire for instant gratification gets in the way of customer service.

In this situation, I could go away thinking about all the things I couldn’t do or that I didn’t receive because I am used to them elsewhere.  Or, as the Irish say, I can enjoy the craic (good fun).  I may not get instant gratification, but being able to write a blog post at 30,000 feet as well as queue up some e-mails for delivery later is just plain cool.

So where have your customer experiences been skewed by your own unrealistic expectations?

Today’s snafu is a little different.  It’s one that could have been avoided.  I’m sure Bank of America doesn’t care because I was able to resolve the issue on my own.  Still, Bank of America’s lack of forethought or a proactive approach wasted my time.  That ticks me off.

So what was the situation?  Bank of America sent me a new credit card for my home equity line they acquired in the Countrywide deal.  Cool!  I don’t like the checks on the HELOC and a credit card is more convenient in handling the transactions i use the HELOC for.  Kudos to Bank of America.  So I call in to activate it.  This is where the customer experience starts to go downhill…

First, the audio greeting is way to long and you MUST listen to it in two languages.  Sorry there is no quick key to move forward in the process.  Did I mention this message was long?  I was surprised I was still awake when the Spanish version finished playing.  And then I had to punch a key to state what language I wanted to continue in.  Grrrrrr.

How Bank of America can fix this.  Simple:  Great the customer and ask what language to continue in.  Then give them the long speech.

Next, they asked me to enter in a lot of information.  I’m nowhere near my files and I don’t have my computer in front of me, so I can’t access the information they are asking for easily.  Yet, they give you an option to continue and enter in more information that you may or may not have.  Again you can move forward.  Then they say sorry, we can’t activate the card.  Please call this number – and then they state the number in triple speed.  Huh?  What just happened here.

How can Bank of America fix this?  There are two ways.  First, In the documentation that they send with the card, you know all the fine print that you need a magnifying glass to read, they could put an insert that states what information you will need to activate your card.  Heck they could even print it right underneath where they glue the card, “You will need the following information to activate this card: [list of info].”  Second, they could put it in the information script when you call in.   If I had known what information I would need, I would have gathered it or I would have hung up before wasting my time on the first call.

All in all, a transaction that should have taken 10 minutes took closer to 40.  I’d like that half hour back.

At least I haven’t had the experience that Chris Brogan recently had with Apple.  See “Be There For Your Customers” on his site to read the story.

The point of both of these stories is this…  As customers we will gladly use your websites and call systems.  If they are well designed, we like them and they save both of us time and money.  However, if these systems become an impediment to us completing the task at hand, then we start to get annoyed.  Annoyed customers may start to rethink their choices of using you as the provider for their products and services.

Thank you for listening to my rant.  I feel better now.  I still want my half hour back, although it’s more like an hour by now.  In addition, now I’m wondering why the mail Bank of America sends me is not bilingual as well.

I’m going to say this once. Reading the book does not do Dan Roam’s work justice. You may say, “OK – it’s a visual design book. That’s what I read Edward R. Tufte for.” You are correct – that is what I read Tufte for as well. In order to maximize the message from Dan Roam’s book, you must see him speak. Here are two opportunities for you to do so (for FREE).

Dan’s first presentation “The Back of the Napkin” is available at The Commonwealth Club of California’s site. The recording of this presentation does not show the whiteboard as it is used during the talk. For that reason, I recommend you read the book prior to viewing this presentation.

Microsoft invited him to speak at Mix09 and they recorded his presentation with the whiteboard. Dan’s second and evolved presentation, “The Way of the Whiteboard: Persuading with Pictures” may be found here…

Play Video

Side note: If you like this approach to communicating, then you may choose to invest in a LiveScribe pen (www.livescribe.com). While I wish the pen supported multiple inks (or my preferred gel ink), it’s great for capturing digital ink. I like it much better than a Tablet PC as it fits my normal workflow by allowing me to use tools that I have used for years – a journal and a pen.